One Man's 2014 World Cup Timezone Inconvenience Is Another Man's Half Day Off Work

Most of the 2014 World Cup matches will be played between 13:00 and 19:00 local time (that means 1:00PM and 7:00PM in American). For London, that means games will be played between 4:00PM and 10:00PM — which is perfect. Most of Europe will have more than ample time to booze up, by flares, gather in a bar or public space, and watch the game under nightfall. Ideal settings for watching sports if you ask us.

For the east coast of the United States, however, that means games will air between 12:00PM and 6:00PM. What will that mean? Well, for starters, a sharp drop off in productivity and unexplained sick days.

How much will it cost employers? It’s tough to say, but there are companies out there crunching the numbers every time a mega-event rolls around and sucks workers out of their cubicles and into “fan mode.” The London Olympics was one of these occasions that overlapped work hours for most Americans.

And then there’s March Madness…

[The Star] Chicago-based executive placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas calculated that U.S. workers had been paid $175 million (U.S.) in the time they took to watch the first two days of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

This year won’t be much different, except for the fact that the matches go on for damn near a month, and there’s just one game played at 22:00 local (that’s 10:00PM) and only seven days between June 12th and July 13th without a match, meaning Americans living on the west coast will rarely get a chance to sit down, relax, and watch a World Cup match after work.

That being said, if you’re only concerned with watching the Americans, the Group Stage schedule will be a problem for the first game, which is on a Monday, and the final game on a Thursday. Here’s a brain numbingly simple breakdown of the times the USMNT will be on TV, fighting for their lives.